


Loyal Companion

by KonohanaShuffle



Category: Warframe
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:27:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25501372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KonohanaShuffle/pseuds/KonohanaShuffle
Summary: Well, I wrote this shortly before a lore reveal that, uh, obsoleted some of the details, but here it is anyway.I just wanted to write a sad dog story. *shakes fist*
Kudos: 13





	Loyal Companion

She limped -- staggered -- down the ramp and into the center of her ship, where lay its few amenities, medical aid among them. A momentary pause to sag against the corridor's smooth wall invited a stirring from the furred bundle in her arms.

"Shh, shh," she breathed, and it subsided.

"Operator!" the ship's cephalon greeted her, belated and slightly alarmed. "Are you injured?"

"Not badly."

She pushed herself from the wall and lessened her limp toward the sparse medical facilities, where she finally knelt, depositing her bundle carefully on the polished floor.

It unfolded into a nearly canine form, bat-like ears flat, pointed tongue lolling with ragged breaths, foam gathering at the corners of its mouth. The toxin was virulent, but that could be tended with ease. It was the leg that concerned her.

The kubrow's right fore dangled by a shred of skin and muscle, and when she touched the limb, a low whine rose in the animal's throat, though she was certain it felt nothing.

The question now was whether to attempt to save the limb.

The question now was whether to attempt to save the kubrow.

She rose, retreated from the animal's trembling form, only to return with an injector, vial filled with clear liquid. She set it to the kubrow's neck and pressed the trigger. A faint "thuk," and the antitoxin was on its way, coursing into the uneven flow of a struggling heart's blood.

"Operator?"

"A moment."

A single, swift motion severed what remained of the body's hold on its leg, and the kubrow, too weak now to flinch, let out a low, keening sound.

"Hush," she whispered. "Hush."

The sound went still, and she brushed her fingertips over the kubrow's long ear. It sighed, eyes closing, and a smile curved her lips behind the polished mask of her helmet.

"Am I mistaken, operator, in thinking that perhaps this kubrow is ... beyond saving?"

She sealed the wound with a gel whose properties she didn't fully understand, only knowing that it had worked once or twice on her, and over that she wrapped bandages once, then again. The kubrow's eyes opened, the one nearest her, at least, and its tongue pulled into its mouth, only to flick out again in a lapping motion.

"It is, after all, infinitely replaceable."

She lifted her hand, brought it to rest near the kubrow's muzzle, felt the heat of ragged breaths. The kubrow pushed its horny nose into her, a sound like whining in its throat, and flicked its dark tongue against her palm.

Yavena, her Yavena, thin and gangly and swift. A genetic cocktail. A tool. An ally. A companion.

"Operator --"

"Ordis," she said, voice a whipcrack, "I require your silence."

There was a brief, affronted pause.

"Very well, operator," the cephalon said at last, and, as promised, he did not speak again.

Her shoulders relaxed, a knot of tension easing away, and she settled next to Yavena in smeared blood and greenish foam, lifting the kubrow's head -- so gently -- into her lap. She stroked her ears, through the rough fur of her forehead, and the dark eyes closed again.

"Hush, my lovely," she crooned. "Hush, my heart. You'll be right by morning. You'll be right."


End file.
